When an event occurs that affects the lives of people, one of the responses is to generate and disseminate comments regarding the event. Often, the comments are made in the form of social content and distributed via one or more online social services. For example, when a massive earthquake struck Japan, millions of people posted, texted, or tweeted information relating to the event. These millions of people included both people directly affected by the earthquake, people tangentially affected by the earthquake, as well as those that demonstrated an interest or concern regarding the earthquake.
While people are often aware of the main topic or topics of a particular event, there are typically numerous sub-topics and related topics to the event, most of which are lost in the buzz surrounding the main topic and go largely unnoticed by the general populace. Referring again to the earthquake and resultant tsunami in Japan (in 2001), information such as the fact that a 250-mile-long coastal section of Japan dropped in altitude by two feet that allowed the tsunami to travel farther and faster inland, though published, received relatively little notice in light of the overall “story” of the quake and the destruction caused by the tsunami. Yet this fact, and many others, tell a very interesting and robust story about the event.
While there are typically numerous, significant details surrounding any given event, many of the details will typically fall into obscurity without any means for retrieving them or accessing them, including viewing/presenting the details within the context of the event. Thus, the true scope of most events is lost.